


Spectator

by LaughtersMelody



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst and Tragedy, Child Death, Dark, Gen, Heavy Angst, Hunger Games-Typical Death/Violence, Self-Hatred, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-07
Updated: 2016-12-18
Packaged: 2018-09-07 02:58:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8780491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaughtersMelody/pseuds/LaughtersMelody
Summary: Over the course of twenty-four long, hard years, Haymitch Abernathy mentored forty-eight kids in the Games, and of those, only two ever made it back. Mentoring, as it turned out, was just another form of torture. A series of snapshots following Haymitch after he won the Games.





	1. The 51st through the 54th Games

**Author's Note:**

> I can't really say where this came from, but Haymitch's character has always interested me, and I've thought a lot about what he might have experienced as a mentor. That would be such an impossibly difficult position to be in, escorting children to their deaths year after year. Words wouldn't really do it justice, and I wanted to explore that.
> 
> WARNING: This is a very dark fic, possibly the darkest fic I've ever written. It deals with quite a lot of death, and occasionally, there's the mention of Haymitch's suicidal thoughts. My beta, after reading it, even suggested I break it up into smaller pieces because she thought the snapshots might be too much at once. So, I want to make it clear up front: I'm very careful not to write in a graphic way, but this story explores some very heavy, very painful emotions and situations. Again, there is the mention of suicidal thoughts, so if you're sensitive to that, or sensitive to dark emotions, please have care before you read. I'd rather you didn't read it at all than be bothered by it. Thank you.
> 
> As always, I thank my Lord Jesus Christ for his incredible mercy and grace and his many blessings. I would be utterly lost without him.

** Spectator  **

_The 51s_ _t_ _Hunger Games_

If Haymitch learns anything during his first year as a mentor, it's that mentoring is a whole new form of torture.

He hadn't thought that was possible. He'd been sure that the Hunger Games and everything that followed had covered just about every kind of agony there was. He'd outlived forty-seven other teenagers, killed more than a handful of them himself, then gotten his family and his girl killed too.

After all that, how could he hate himself any more than he already does?

But this, this feeling of utter _helplessness,_ is a totally different kind of pain, and it cuts just as surely as the blade that gutted him in the arena.

His tributes are going to die.  Allen James and Marjorie Dunsford are going to die.

He knows that the second they're reaped.

Allen is sixteen, but he's so small that he looks a few years younger. Marjorie is fifteen. She's taller than Allen, but she looks like a strong breeze could blow her over too.

They're not strangers. They were his classmates just last year - it feels like a lifetime ago - and they're both from the Seam, like he is. Still, he's not friends with them. He only knows them in passing.

As it turns out, that's enough. That's plenty.

Because they're going to die.

Even if they stood a chance against the other tributes - and they don't - he knows without a shadow of a doubt that the Gamemakers will make sure they die horrible, ugly deaths, just because _he's_ their mentor.

He's right.

That's exactly what they do.

And Haymitch? All he can do is watch.

* * *

 _The 52n_ _d_ _Hunger Games_

Haymitch had dreaded these Games for a long time, because this year would have been his little brother's first Reaping.

Of course, Aaron doesn't have to worry about the Reaping now, and he never will.

He's dead.

That's not enough for the Capitol, though. No, the Capitol seems intent on making Haymitch _pay, and pay, and pay_ , and it will probably never be enough. If they could, he's sure they'd bring Aaron back just so they could kill him again.

They can't do that, but Haymitch knows they _can_ \- and will - make these Games just as horrible as he feared they would be.

So, it's not really a surprise when the name Kernan Alsbey is called, and it's a twelve-year-old boy who bears a striking resemblance to Haymitch's dead little brother in all but one way.

Unlike his little brother, Kernan walks slowly, his hands out in front of him like he's afraid he'll bump into something. If the Peacekeepers weren't there to guide him up to the stage, he might not have found it.

He's not blind, Haymitch learns. Oh, no, he can see. He can see about two feet in front of him. After that, everything gets real blurry. Haymitch doesn't know exactly what the problem is with the kid's eyes, but he's pretty sure that the Capitol could fix it in a few minutes.

They don't.

The girl who's reaped, Emma Lee, she's from the Seam too, and Haymitch knows her. She's eighteen, with three little brothers of her own, and she takes Kernan under her wing, guiding him around the penthouse and the training center patiently.

She dies in the area almost right away, trying to lead Kernan away from the bloodbath.

Kernan is easy prey after that.

The Careers make his death a sort of terrifying version of blind man's bluff, taunting him, and it's slow and bloody, and Haymitch knows he'll be seeing it over and over again in his nightmares for years to come.

And yet, somehow, in spite of that, he's grateful. He's grateful that if anyone had to die that way, it was Kernan Alsbey, not Aaron Abernathy.

It's that feeling, that sick _gratitude_ , which eventually drives Haymitch out of the penthouse and down to the nearest bar for the first time in his life.

It won't be the last.

* * *

 _The 53r_ _d_ _Hunger Games_

For the 53rd Games, Haymitch starts to wonder if maybe, just maybe, the Capitol is actually gonna to give him a break, because this year, his tributes are seventeen and eighteen, one from Town and the other from the Seam, and they both have potential. They're not the biggest tributes around, but they're both solid looking, and both of them are athletes.

He doesn't recognize the girl, Lissa Tolsen, but the boy, Cole Roberts, looks familiar, and it takes Haymitch a while to realize that he and Cole were in the same class a few years ago (if it felt like a lifetime before, it feels like an eternity now).

Haymitch tries not to get his hopes up, but it's not easy because his tributes keep showing promise. They actually get a few good remarks in the running commentary, their training scores are pretty decent, and there's even a moment where someone asks, "Could Twelve do it again this year?"

Eventually, Haymitch lets himself start to believe it.

It's a mistake.

Lissa has a run-in with a well-placed ax, and Cole gets ripped to pieces by a mutt so hideous that Haymitch can't even tell what it is.

He goes to collect their bodies for transport back to Twelve, and swears that he'll never let himself hope again.

Hope, for him, doesn't seem to do anything but hurt.

* * *

 _The 54t_ _h_ _Hunger Games_

By the time the 54th Games roll around, Haymitch has completely embraced the glorious benefits of alcohol.

It's funny, because his father drank himself to death, and Haymitch never thought he'd touch the stuff, but now, he finds himself reaching for a bottle more and more.

Maybe, if he's lucky, he'll drink himself to death too.

His escort makes some noise about him setting a bad example for the tributes, especially because he's technically not even of _legal age_ yet. That makes him laugh, because his tributes are never going to reach the legal drinking age themselves, and he's pretty sure that if they actually managed to win the Games, they wouldn't _want_ to reach it.

Haymitch doesn't.

His predictions are right, of course.

Ash Owens and Tess Butler both die in the bloodbath.

Haymitch just stares at the screen for a moment, then reaches for a bottle, telling himself it means nothing when his hands start to shake.

That gets harder when they refuse to stop.

* * *

**TBC**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is already complete, so updates should be every few days or so.
> 
> Thanks for reading, and please let me know what you think! 
> 
> -Laughter


	2. The 55th through the 59th Games

** Spectator **

_The 55t_ _h_ _Hunger Games_

For the 55th Hunger Games, two kids from Town are reaped.

It doesn't happen often, but it does happen.

Once, Haymitch might have been glad about that (as glad he can be about people getting picked for a death match) just because it means that there won't be another family mourning in the Seam. The fact that they're from Town also means he's never talked to them before, and selfish as it sounds, that makes it all a little easier.

But, it turns out that even if he's never met Davy Mills and Rin Harwick, he's still connected to them on some level, because they knew Maysillee. They were a few years behind her in school, but they both frequented the sweet shop that her family owns.

They make sure Haymitch knows that, and they keep talking about how great Maysilee was and how bad they feel for her sister.

In a weird way, that's almost encouraging, because if his tributes are trying to guilt him into helping them win, then they're sneaky and manipulative, and that might just give 'em an edge in the arena.

It doesn't, though, and for weeks afterwards, Haymitch dreams about Maysillee, and every night, she keeps demanding to know why he let them die.

* * *

 _The 56th_ _Hunger Games_

His tributes this year are Trev James and Callie Morgan.

As soon as he hears the boy's name, he's struck by how familiar it is, but that doesn't make sense, because the kid is just fourteen, too young to have been in school with him, so by all rights, Haymitch shouldn't know him.

And he doesn't, not really. It's just that Trev James is Allen James's little brother.

Allen James. The boy Haymitch mentored his first year. The boy who died in agony because of the Capitol's vendetta with Haymitch. (Trev doesn't die as badly as his brother, but by the second day of the Games, he's still dead, and so is Callie Morgan.)

It's hard to believe. Their district isn't big, sure, but it's big enough. The odds of one family losing two boys a few years apart should be infinitesimal. But the odds, Haymitch knows, never really are in their favor, and it won't be the only time something like this happens.

Not every family is going to lose two of their own, but everybody is connected somehow. It will always be someone's brother, sister, cousin, niece, or nephew. Maybe even the brother, sister, cousin, niece or nephew of someone Haymitch knows. And far enough down the line, it'll be their kids that he's hauling off to the Capitol to die - the son or daughter of somebody he'd been friends with once upon a time.

So, right then and there, Haymitch decides that he'll stop paying attention to the tributes' names, because what he doesn't know can't hurt him.

(But of course it can.)

* * *

 _The 57th_   _Hunger Games_

It's a gray, rainy day when the Reaping for the 57th Games takes place, which means that they all have to stand out in the downpour, but Haymitch doesn't mind it too much. It's fitting, and it's actually kind of funny, because his escort didn't have the foresight to wear waterproof makeup, so all the ridiculously bright colors on her face run together, making her look like a melted tutti-fruity Popsicle.

The amusement doesn't last long, though, because after the kids are reaped, Haymitch is jumped on the way to the train.

It's the girl's father (the girl - Haymitch is determined to think of her that way now, and not as Kayla Pines). The furious, desperate man presses a knife to Haymitch's throat, saying that Haymitch better bring his little girl home, because if he doesn't, then he'll die in a way that's worse than anything the Gamemakers could cook up. (That's not possible, Haymitch knows, but he isn't gonna say that to a grieving father whose little girl is about to experience the Gamemakers' latest masterpiece.)

No, what Haymitch actually does is take the man's knife and call him an idiot, because Haymitch is a broken-down Victor, sure, but he's still a _Victor_ , and if the man wants to die before his daughter ever makes it home, then attacking a Victor is the way to do it.

As it turns out, Haymitch is right.

The Capitol doesn't like it when their Victors are jumped in alleyways, even Victors like Haymitch, because as far as they're concerned, Victors are their property, so an attack on a Victor is an attack on them.

Jacob Pines disappears before the Games are even finished. If he's lucky, he's in the Capitol somewhere, serving as an Avox.

Haymitch is pretty sure that he isn't lucky.

His daughter is, though.

She dies before learning just what happened to her dad.

* * *

 _The 58t_ _h_ _Hunger Games_

The boy is a nice kid. That's all Haymitch can think about this year, and it's not really fair to the girl, but she's a ditzy Townie teen, a Capitol-wannabe with an annoying little giggle that his escort just finds "delightful." It doesn't mean she should die, but it does mean that Haymitch can't stand to spend five minutes in the same room with her.

The boy, though, he's a genuinely nice, polite, friendly Seam kid. At least, he is when you can get him to talk, but it's getting him to talk that's the problem. When it's time for the interview, the kid barely says three words, and he's not anywhere near intimidating enough to pull that sort of thing off.

In the arena, the girl tries cozying up to a Career, and it makes Haymitch wish he'd spent more time with her because he would have told her not to do it. That ends pretty much how you'd expect it to, with the girl at the end of a sharp blade.

The boy actually manages to make it a few days, until he's found by the same Career that killed the girl. The announcers sound surprised when it happens, like they'd forgotten the boy even existed.

Haymitch never forgot him, though.

Not that it did any good.

* * *

 _The 59t_ _h_ _Hunger Games_

The girl that gets reaped for the 59th Games is eighteen, and she's engaged. It's not that unusual in Twelve. Yeah, she's young, but this would have been her last Reaping, and she's from the Seam, so her fiancé is sure to be heading to the mines soon, if he isn't there already.

She doesn't look anything like Haymitch's girl did. Even with the typical Seam look - tan skin, gray eyes, and dark hair - her nose isn't the right shape, her eyes are a shade too light, and she's too tall.

But every time he looks at her, Haymitch winds up thinking about his girl anyway.

It's not fair to the boy, because like the year before, the other tribute is getting all of Haymitch's attention, but the kid doesn't seem to mind that. He's a Seam boy from the Community Home, and he's too jaded to imagine that he has any chance of winning, with or without his mentor's help. Haymitch gets the feeling that he actually prefers to be alone for the time he's got left.

So, that's what Haymitch does. He spends most of his time with the girl, trying not to call her Nell because then she'll ask him who Nell is, and he doesn't want to explain to his tribute that if she wins, it might just put her fiancé's life in danger. It's selfish, maybe, but he's a selfish guy, and the girl is smart and pretty, and she might actually do okay if she tries.

He wants her to try.

For the interviews, the girl talks about how great her fiancé is, how much she loves him, and how much she wants to make it home so they can marry and start a family.

When the Games begin, the boy from the Community Home dies quick, not even making it past the bloodbath, but the girl lasts five days. Then, on the sixth day, she falls from a tree and breaks her neck.

It's a waste of a death as far as the commentators are concerned because she wasn't even in danger, she was just trying to get a better view of the arena.

Haymitch agrees - it's a waste, a stupid, stupid waste.

But then again, that's what the Games always are: a waste.

* * *

**TBC**


	3. The 60th Through the 63rd Games

** Spectator  **

_The 60th_ _Hunger Games_

The 60th Games are rough. Rougher than usual, anyway, and that's saying something. Part of it is because it's been ten years now, and the number shouldn't really matter, but somehow it does.

The kids don't make it any easier.

The girl is thirteen, a tiny little thing with no chance at all, and she just can't seem to stop crying.

The boy is sixteen and angry that he's about to die, and the girl's tears just make him angrier, which just makes her cry harder, and in the end, Haymitch has to keep them apart every minute just to preserve his sanity.

What's left of it, anyway.

When it's time for the interviews, the girl breaks down on stage, sobbing, and Caesar tries to turn it into sympathy votes, but Haymitch is pretty sure the Capitol only finds her pathetic. (She's not, because she's just a kid who doesn't deserve any of this, but if the Capitol could see that, then none of them would be here in the first place.) The boy doesn't fare any better - he's practically yelling at the audience by the time his interview wraps up, and Haymitch knows this won't end well.

It doesn't.

In the arena, the kid's platform blows up right after the gong sounds, and the announcers speculate that he must have stepped off of it a fraction of a second too early, but it's obvious what it really is.

A warning.

The girl dies only half a minute behind him.

* * *

_The 61st Hunger Games_

Months before the 61st Hunger Games even start, Haymitch decides that he's taking this year off (as much as he can anyway).

He drinks his way through it.

He barely speaks to his tributes, and when he tries, his words are so slurred that they probably can't understand a thing he says.

 _Haymitch_ can't understand a thing he says.

In the end, he can't even remember how it happened, but he knows the kids died. They always do.

It's funny, though, because he'd thought that being drunk out of his mind would make it better.

But it doesn't.

It makes it worse.

* * *

 _The 62nd_ _Hunger Games_

For the 62nd Games, Haymitch doesn't drink as much as he did the year before.

He's seriously tempted, though, because this is the year that the Capitol assigns him a new escort.

It's not the first time that's happened. He's had a string of escorts since he won, but none of them were quite like Effie Trinket. She's in love with manners and schedules, her voice is like fingernails on a chalkboard - at least it sounds that way in Haymitch's mostly hung-over state - and she's ridiculous from her four-inch heels to her neon purple wig.

But, arguing with her winds up being pretty entertaining - when he's sober enough to manage it - and that's a welcome distraction from the fact that he's got two more Seam kids - fifteen-year-olds this time - to lead to their deaths.

Trinket, on the other hand, doesn't see that they're doomed. No, she's convinced that this year, Twelve will have another winner. She's even perky and cheerful about it all, right up to the end.

She cries when the kids die, though - not crocodile tears either, but real ones - and try as he might, Haymitch just can't find it in himself to hate her. Not really.

* * *

 _The 63rd_ _Hunger Games_

This year, there's a fourteen-year-old boy that glares sullenly at everything and everyone, and a sixteen-year-old girl who keeps asking questions with a desperate sort of determination.

The boy might stand half a chance if he could channel that anger into something productive, but right now, he's coming across as a pouting teenager rather than a dangerous opponent, and if that doesn't change, he won't last long.

The girl, though, corners Haymitch on the train that first night, desperate determination still shining brightly in her eyes.

"Tell me how to win. You did it. Tell me what I need to do."

He squints at her blearily, one corner of his mouth quirking wryly as he studies her.

"You sound awfully eager, little girl. You gonna tell me that you would've volunteered if you weren't reaped?"

The girl shakes her head quickly in refusal. "No. I didn't ask for this. But I figure if I win, it'll solve a lot of problems."

Haymitch barks a sharp laugh; a sober corner of his brain realizes that it sounds vaguely like a sob.

"Take it from me, kid," he says. "If you win, your problems are just beginning."

The boy dies on the second day, still glaring sullenly at his killer, and the girl…the girl doesn't win, so none of it matters.

(But of course it does.)

* * *

**TBC**


	4. The 64th through the 67th Games

** Spectator  **

_The 64th Hunger Games_

"I'm not going to kill anyone."

That's the first thing the girl tells him this year, point blank.

"Then you'll die," Haymitch says just as bluntly.

"I know." Her eyes are sad but accepting and strangely peaceful.

The boy looks at her like she's crazy, and maybe he's right, but then again, the boy dies at the Cornucopia, trying to reach the sword positioned at its mouth.

The girl dies too, just a few days later, but when it happens, there's no blood on her hands, and she takes her last breath with a small, serene smile on her face.

Haymitch can't help thinking that if she was crazy, then that's the kind of crazy he would have liked to be.

* * *

_The 65th Hunger Games_

Haymitch's kids have no chance this year - not that they ever do.

But that became especially true the minute the Capitol got a look at Mags's boy. He's just fourteen, but he's handsome and charming, and he strode up to the Reaping stage wearing a confident grin and winking at the cameras like he was in on a secret that no one else knew.

He'll be the winner of the 65th Hunger Games - the Capitol will make sure of that. He already has sponsors lined up around the block.

Later, when Haymitch's kids are headed back to Twelve in their coffins, and Finnick Odair is being presented with the Victor's crown to riotous applause, Mags's reaction is a small, tight smile that doesn't reach her eyes.

Haymitch wonders if she ever told the boy what being the Capitol's favorite will mean for his future.

Given the way Finnick's smile doesn't reach his eyes either, maybe she did.

* * *

_The 66th Hunger Games_

There aren't many people from Twelve that the Capitol would call "bright." That's mostly because the Capitol thinks of them all as country bumpkins who aren't good for anything besides manual labor. It's not true, but there _is_ a grain of truth in the stereotype - a lot people in Twelve see school as a waste of time. After all, why bother with a lot of book learning when your future is already mapped out for you? If you're from the Seam, you'll be stuck down in the mines for the better part of your life; if you're from Town, you'll be taking over your parents' business or apprenticing somewhere else.

But, the sixteen-year-old boy that Haymitch gets this year…he's bright. It's obvious the second he opens his mouth. He probably did real well in school. He's from the Seam, so his options were limited, but Haymitch is sure that if the boy hadn't been reaped, he would have been on-track to become one of the mine engineers. (The girl is from the Seam too, but she's shy, soft-spoken, and _sweet_ , and she won't last five minutes in the Games.)

Haymitch tells the boy to show off his intelligence in his interview. It's a strategy Three uses all the time, and it's bound to get them at least a few sponsors.

The boy refuses, though, and Haymitch demands to know why.

The kid bites his lip, looking uncomfortable.  "Because I don't think I want to win," he says at last, his eyes apologetic and more than a little sad. "I don't want to become like you."

 _Smart kid_ , Haymitch thinks later, when he's waiting to collect his tributes' bodies for transport back to Twelve. _Smart kid_.

* * *

_The 67th Hunger Games_

For the 67th Hunger Games, a fifteen-year-old boy and a seventeen-year-old girl are reaped from the Seam. They're not friends exactly, but they know each other, and they immediately decide that they wanna work together. Haymitch lets them, because neither of them have the makings of a Victor, and he figures they'll last longer together than they will apart.

They do okay for a couple days, mostly because the arena is a ruined city, and it has lots of places for them to hide. It even has a rickety, unmanned train that continually circles the crumbling buildings. (Haymitch almost wonders if some idiot Gamemaker thought he was being witty, including a train that never stops.)

The thing about the city, though, is that there's not much food to be found, and all the running and hiding isn't gonna help win his kids sponsors.  That means they'll probably starve.

Of course, they don't last long enough for that to be a problem.

On day three, they pick the wrong building to hide in, and it collapses around them, killing them both.

But at least it was fast.

* * *

**TBC**


	5. The 68th through the 71st Games

** Spectator  **

_The 68th Hunger Games_

The kids from Twelve don't get offers for an alliance very often. Mostly, it's because everybody knows that Twelve's kids are doomed from the start, and who would want to ally with that?

This year, though, Haymitch's boy is eighteen, and he actually has some muscle on him. His girl is fifteen, and she's picked up a lot during training. That must have been enough for the tributes from Ten, because they want to team up. Haymitch immediately tells his kids to say yes, and not just because of the novelty. Ten's girl apparently had the job of slaughtering cows back home, so she's pretty good with a knife, and Ten's boy is a decent size, not very tall, but bulky for someone who isn't a Career.

Together, the four of them might actually have a shot at surviving in the arena, at least until the numbers start to dwindle. (A little voice reminds Haymitch what happened last time he thought his kids had a chance, but he tells it to shut up.)

Things are good for the first three days. They even have enough sponsors for Haymitch to send in a few supplies.

First on the list is a heavy blanket, because the Gamemakers decided to go with an arctic theme for the 68th Games, and the arena is all tundra, without a tree in sight. (Haymitch wishes he could send them some firewood and matches instead, but that's one of this year's premium sponsor gifts, and the price just keeps going up and up. His kids and Ten's are doing well, but not _that_ well.)

That's the thing, though. By day six, the kids aren't doing well at all. The Gamemakers have dropped the temp in the arena every single night, and he's pretty sure that all the kids are suffering from hypothermia.

In the end, it's the blanket that sets it off.

Ten's tributes decide that they shouldn't have to share it with Twelve. (Actually, they're probably better off sharing it, since it means more body heat for everybody, but hypothermia can mess with your head and so can the arena.)

Ten's girl winds up slitting his boy's throat, and Ten's boy bashes his girl's head in with a rock.

Later that night, Ten's tributes both freeze to death, still wrapped in the blanket they killed his kids to get, and Haymitch feels dead inside too, just in a different way.

* * *

_The 69th Hunger Games_

For the 69th Hunger Games, the arena is a garden on steroids. The Gamemakers proudly announce that President Snow even had some input in its design, being an avid lover of flora himself. It's full of giant, colorful flowers, massive insects, and huge green plants (most of which are poisonous, and Haymitch is pretty sure that was Snow's major contribution).

Haymitch spends the better part of two days staring at the screens in his mentoring suite, watching his tributes and trying not to have flashbacks of his own arena. (It's not exactly the same, but it's close enough, and he wonders if that was Snow's _other_ contribution.)

Then, on day three, his boy falls prey to a swarm of mutt locusts, and his girl gets stuck in a plant the commentators call "a Venus flytrap," except it's enormous and it's not trapping flies, it's trapping tributes.

The commentators helpfully explain that this genetically engineered flytrap kills much more quickly than the smaller, natural variety, but if that was "quick," then Haymitch doesn't want to know what they'd consider "slow."

* * *

_The 70th Hunger Games_

This year, they drown. They all drown.

The kids in water and Haymitch in his drink.

It's not fair (it never is) because at first, his kids are scraping by. Sure, his girl, a pretty blonde from Town, hasn't eaten much besides leaves and roots since the Games started, and his boy, a thirteen-year-old kid from the Seam, has a broken arm from a fall. But eight days in, they are  _still alive_ , and that has to be some kind of record.

Then the earthquake happens.

It could be the Gamemakers' way of shaking things up - literally - because the 70th Games have been pretty tame so far, with only a handful or tributes killed in the bloodbath, and the audience is probably bored.

But Haymitch has seen the recap of the Reaping in Four, and he didn't miss the way that Finnick went stark white when Annie Cresta's name was called. He hasn't missed the way Finnick has been in and out of Game Headquarters since then, either.

So, when the dam breaks, Haymitch knows it's no coincidence, because Annie Cresta is the only tribute left in the arena who can swim well enough to make it.

She makes it, alright.

At least…she's still breathing. Her ear-piercing screams as they pull her into the hovercraft don't bode well for her continued mental health.

But, sane or not, she's made it out - Finnick _got her out_ , and he killed both of Haymitch's kids in the process. 

Haymitch wants to hate him for it.

There's just one problem with that.

Finnick might have rigged the Game in his favor, but Haymitch has been around long enough to know how to play the system too. He could have done _something_.  For once, he'd had the time.  But he'd done nothing.  Nothing that really mattered, anyway.

No, Haymitch thinks as he stares into an empty glass, he doesn't hate Finnick.

He hates himself instead.

* * *

_The 71st Hunger Games_

Haymitch didn't see Johanna Mason coming, but then again, nobody saw Johanna Mason coming. He's got to hand it to her - that was some strategy. The weak, blubbering girl who'd sobbed her way through her whole interview with Caesar had suddenly turned into a vicious killer.

And she _is_ a killer, that's for sure (they all are) but she's not quite as vicious as she pretends to be…not quite a grinning lunatic with an ax, even if that's what she wants the Capitol to think.

It's the little things that give her away: the flat look in her eyes and the stiff line of her shoulders when she waves to the enthusiastic crowd at her Victory Party.

Still, Haymitch knows she would have gone through his kids like a hot knife through butter. A frail thirteen-year-old boy and a tiny fourteen-year-old girl from the Seam would have been easy prey. She didn't get that chance, though. Both his kids died in the bloodbath when Johanna Mason was still the sobbing girl from Seven.

That's why, when Johanna walks up to him with a sneer saying, "So, you're Twelve's drunk," he can raise his whisky-filled glass to her and slur, "Glad to meet you," and really mean it too.

* * *

**TBC**


	6. The 72nd through the 74th Games

** Spectator  **

_The 72nd Hunger Games_

For the 72nd Hunger Games, Haymitch gets a comedian. It seems like that, at least. The boy starts cracking jokes the minute he sets foot on the train. It drives Effie crazy, and Haymitch likes that. Besides, it's probably the kid's way of coping, and who is he to knock it? It's better than tears.

The girl, on the other hand, starts to complain about the fact that her district partner isn't taking this seriously. ("I'm gonna die in a few days," the boy snaps at her. "I wanna laugh while I can." The girl shuts up about it after that.)

Even during training, the kid is the class clown, armed with a cheeky retort instead of a knife, and somehow, he keeps it up in the arena too. (About the only time he stops telling jokes to the hidden cameras is when the girl's picture appears in the night sky.)

A few people must think the kid's got guts, acting like that, because Haymitch gets some sponsors who chuckle as they write their checks.

It's not enough, though (it's never enough) and a couple days later, one of the Careers finds the kid. The Career isn't armed with anything except his fists, but he knows how to use them and he does.

"Always knew…I'd be a…big…hit," the kid quips weakly, offering one, last lop-sided smirk.

His canon sounds a few minutes later.

* * *

_The 73rd Hunger Games_

Haymitch prefers the angry kids…the kids who rage or glare and tell him how pathetic he is. How useless he is as a mentor. They're easier to deal with. (It's no easier to watch them die, not even after all this time, but it's not quite as much of a punch in the gut when it happens.) It's the nice kids, the friendly, genuinely _good_ kids that make his job even harder, because he _knows_ they're doomed, but he finds himself starting to like them anyway.

Just his luck, he gets two good kids this year.

Their table manners are, according to Effie, "atrocious," but the fact that she's so irritated by it just earns them some extra points in Haymitch's book. Overall, they're quick to listen when he talks (even when he slurs his words), they thank him for his advice (useless as it's going to be), and they act like he did something real to give them a shot at winning (even though they're wrong).

When he tells them goodbye the night before the Games start, the girl gives him a little wave and the boy gives him a small smile, and he's sure it'll be the last time he sees them.

It is. They both die in the bloodbath, just like Haymitch knew they would.

Afterwards, he heads to the nearest bar so he can drink to their memory, and then he keeps on drinking to forget them.

It doesn't work, of course. It never does.

But that doesn't stop him from trying.

* * *

_The 74th Hunger Games_

_Stay alive_. That's what Haymitch tells this year's kids when he's sober enough to manage it. _Stay alive._

And then he laughs, because that's the one thing his tributes never do: stay alive.

The boy doesn't like that and actually takes a swing at him, knocking the glass out of his hand. (Haymitch is almost glad - he was sure the boy was gonna be just another good kid who's doomed. But judging by the glare the boy's wearing now, he might be more.) The girl jumps in when Haymitch swings back at the boy, and that's when Haymitch has to remind himself not to hope, because these kids…these kids are gonna die, of course they are. That's what his kids do.

Still, when they start bargaining with him for his help, he agrees (he would have helped them anyway, but they don't need to know that) and two things become clear pretty fast

One, the girl is a survivor. (The boy might be a survivor too, though considering the looks he's giving the girl, there's something he cares about more than his _own_ survival). And two, this is the best chance Twelve's had _in years_ , because these kids are different.

Both of them could have a shot. An _actual_ shot. That little voice in Haymitch's head calls him an idiot, but Haymitch figures that if he hasn't learned his lesson after twenty-four years, then he never will.

There's the rub, though. Both of the kids have a shot, but only one can walk out of the arena alive, and he has to decide which one he's going to back.

It doesn't take him long to pick the girl.

She volunteered, after all, and she already has the Capitol all abuzz because of the sheer novelty. He can use that. She obviously knows how to handle herself too, and there's an edge about her that the boy just doesn't have.

It's a quick decision, but not an easy one, because any other year, with any other girl, he would have favored the boy. The kid is strong, and he seems smart. He isn't bad lookin' either, by Capitol standards, and - unlike the girl - he knows how to turn up the charm. Others have won with less.

But only one can make it out so Haymitch will sacrifice the boy (who really is just a doomed good kid after all) to save the girl, because the girl might be just what Haymitch needs…what they _all_ need.

It's not fair, and it's not right (the Games never are) and Haymitch knows he has no choice but to live with it.

The boy makes that a little easier, because the first chance they have to talk alone, he tells Haymitch to concentrate on saving the girl. He's not just saying that so Haymitch will sleep better at night (not that he ever sleeps much anyway). No, he really means it.

Haymitch doesn't know what to do when he's got a martyr on his hands anymore than he knows what to do with a potential Victor, but he assures the kid that he'll have things his way.

The kid seems satisfied and even promises to help. And he does. The night of the interviews, the boy makes his tragic little love announcement _perfectly,_ playing the audience like a fiddle, and Haymitch can't help thinking that the kid's death will be such a waste, such a terrible, horrible, pointless waste (like always) but maybe he can make sure it means something.

It's not enough, though, it's not nearly enough, because even if the kid's death isn't in vain, he'll still be _dead_ , and Haymitch is tired of bringing kids home in coffins.

So, in the end, Haymitch decides to do exactly what he did in the arena, twenty-four years ago: he keeps moving until he finds something useful, then waits to see just where the ax will swing. It's a risky move, and it could cost him both his tributes, but maybe, just maybe, it'll get them both home instead.

It does. By some miracle - and a handful of berries - it does.

His girl and his boy are weary, beaten, and traumatized - and in the boy's case, missing a few important parts - but they're still breathing. They're _both_ still breathing.

Haymitch isn't an idiot (despite what the voice in his head may say) and he knows his kids are really in for it now. If the Capitol has made _him_ pay and pay and pay, then the Capitol will make the Star-Crossed Lovers bleed and bleed and bleed.

But Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark are both alive _to_ bleed, and right now, that's all Haymitch really cares about.

The rest…well, the rest he'll worry about later.

* * *

 

**Fin**

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is already complete, so updates should be every few days or so.
> 
> Thanks for reading, and please let me know what you think! 
> 
> -Laughter


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